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Yom HaShoah falls on Tuesday, May 4, 2027. That is 189 days away.

Yom HaShoah is a Jewish day of remembrance for the millions of Jews murdered in the Holocaust by Nazi Germany and its collaborators. It also honors those who resisted and those who survived. The name comes from Hebrew, where Shoah is the word used for the Holocaust.

The day is observed in Jewish communities around the world, and it is marked in the United States too. American observances usually take place in synagogues, community centers, schools and Holocaust museums. They tend to be quiet and simple. Candles are lit, often six of them, and memorial prayers such as the Kaddish may be recited.

Many ceremonies include a reading of names. Volunteers take turns reading the names of individual victims aloud, sometimes for hours, with their ages and hometowns when those are known. The point is to turn a vast number back into people, one name at a time.

Testimony is central as well. Where survivors are able to speak, communities invite them to share their stories. More often now, their children and grandchildren speak for them, or recorded interviews are played for the audience.

In Israel, a siren sounds across the country during the day, and people stop where they are and stand in silence, including drivers who step out of their cars on the road.

Ways to celebrate

• Attend a local memorial service at a synagogue, community center or museum.
• Light a memorial candle at home in remembrance.
• Volunteer to read names at a community name reading ceremony.
• Listen to a recorded survivor testimony from a museum archive.
• Read a memoir written by a Holocaust survivor.

Dates

All national days on May 4

Also on May 4

• Star Wars Day
• National Orange Juice Day
• National Candied Orange Peel Day
• National Teacher Day
• National Weather Observers Day

Categories: Religious daysCommemorative days